


Scientific Method

by knittersrevolt



Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Big Bang Challenge, Complete, Dubious Science, For Science!, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Peter Parker is an Avenger, Science Bros, Spideypool - Freeform, Spideypool Big Bang, Stark Intern Peter Parker, Trust The Data
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-06
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-23 14:32:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 14,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11404410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knittersrevolt/pseuds/knittersrevolt
Summary: When Peter proposes to Wade he's left brokenhearted with a lot of unanswered questions. Naturally there's only one thing he can turn to, SCIENCE! Through a series of misunderstandings and misinterpretations of the data, Peter and Wade make their way back to each other.





	1. Phase 1: Problem

**Author's Note:**

> This work is part of the Big Bang put on by Spideypoolfanfic on Tumblr! I will update once a day until all 8 chapters are up!

* Big Bang Drawing by Invidia. https://invidiasec.tumblr.com/ 

Okay so he was excited. Just really so fucking excited. Like, first-time-ever-swinging-through-the-city excited, or first-day-as-a-Stark-intern excited. The ring, his father’s wedding ring, couldn’t be kept in a box because how was he supposed to hide that in the Spider-Man suit? Wade made a point to comment on his ass at every turn. He commented on almost all of Peter’s body parts in the skin tight spandex, so yeah, no way way he’d be able to hide a bulge like that. Instead he was going old school cliche, wearing the ring on a thin gold chain around his neck. Even Aunt May had been excited for him when he’d asked her to get it from its hidden spot in her house.

He was so excited he nearly got taken out by a Doom-bot, and whoa would that be embarrassing. As much as Peter hoped he’d make it to old age, he’d probably get smashed to bits by a bad guy some day. There were just some villains he felt were more… worthy than others. He’d die a second death of shame if Doom took him out. Even the name, Victor Von Doom was just laughable. Sure, he stirred shit up sometimes, but he mainly went after the Fantastic 4, and everybody knew they were the least bad-assy of the superheros hanging out in Manhattan. Or maybe it was just that nobody liked Richard Reed. Did he dismiss Doom as a real villain because Reed was a Class A jackass? (The A standing for Asshole).

Whatever. It wasn’t important. What was important was that Wade was going to arrive any minute, and Peter was going to propose to him, he’d say yes, and then they’d eat an epic number of tacos in between sweaty sexy fun times. It was going to be awesome.

“Spidey, my Snookums, my own true love, tell me that food has a place in my near future.” Deadpool blinked rapidly, probably trying to bat his eyelashes through the mask. The effect was lost since he was still scaling the side of the building. He finally crested over then tumbled down the ledge of the roof before skipping his way to the perch Peter was sitting on. Their two uniforms cast a red glow onto the cement in the fading twilight.

“You make me sound like a fortune teller, ‘I see many hand held snacks in your future’.”

“Hand held snacks… do you mean tacos? Fuck, that sounds like a great future to me.” Wade paused and nodded to himself. “Yes, he is, Yellow, yes he is.”

Their legs dangled down over the edge. Wade ran his hand along Peter’s thigh in a way that was loving and yet awfully suggestive at the same time.

“I’ll ignore you blatantly talking to yourself-”

“I wasn’t talking to myself! I was talking to the Yellow Box! Now White Box is all jealous.”

“-and make an awkward segue. So speaking of the future…” The excitement disintegrated into a wall of nervousness as he pulled off his mask to get the chain out from beneath his suit.

He didn’t bother getting down on one knee, just leaned over with the ring in his hand, and asked, “Hey Wade, how would you feel about marrying me?”

For an instant everything was all good. Wade’s hands went to his face in the classic Home Alone pose to show his genuine shock. Then he started talking. And everything went to shit.

“Are you proposing to me?” he asked, completely incredulous.

All the shiny lustrous hope Peter had stored up started oozing away. “Well yeah,” he chuckled nervously, “That’s usually what a ring and a ‘will you marry me’ means.”

And then Wade started to giggle hysterically. “Why would you propose to me? Did you hit your head? Do you want me to get Banner to look at you?” He pressed a gloved hand to Peter’s forehead, checking for fever. Peter batted it away.

The last little shred of hope Peter clung to was that maybe Wade was trying to be funny and failing miserably. Wouldn’t be the first time. “I didn’t hit my head, Wade. Proposing is what you do when you’re in love with your boyfriend and you want him to be your husband instead.”

“I’m not your boyfriend. We aren’t dating.” Wade shrugged matter of factly.

“Yes, we are.” Peter said vehemently.

“Then why did I have sex with Shiklah this morning?” His tone was completely neutral. He was just asking a question he genuinely wanted the answer to, oblivious to the rending effect it had on Peter’s heart.

“What?”

Slowly Peter realized that he was still holding the ring out. The shiny gold band facing up, a thin string of gold hanging down, limply over his wrist. Just as slowly, he started to lower it, pull it back into his body. Maybe he could pull his heart back into his chest with it.

“Well, I mean, we’re clearly not exclusive. Unless we had that discussion and I totally missed it, in which case my bad. White says that we didn’t, and he’s pretty darn trustworthy. Most of the time. Sometimes. This time in particular I’m trusting him.”

“You’re sleeping with other people.” Peter meant to phrase it as a question, or maybe make it sound accusatory. Really, he just sounded resigned and sad.

“Well yeah, aren’t you?”

“NO! No Wade, I’m not having sex with anyone else because you sleep in my bed every time you’re in town you eaT MY FOOD, WE MAKE CHRISTMAS PRESENTS FOR EACH OTHER, YOU TELL ME THAT YOU LOVE ME, AND YOU KNOW MY REAL IDENTITY! THESE ARE BOYFRIEND THINGS!”

Wade blinked behind the mask some more. “Well shit. I think have like four boyfriends.”

The embarrassment, the complete, dismal, humiliation was unreal. He made sure the ring was firmly back in its place between his skin and the suit before he leapt off the building. The emotions were so thick, so heavy, he was afraid his line would snap under their weight. He let himself fall longer and swing lower as he made his way back to his dank shitty apartment. Maybe a tall truck would accidentally knock him out and he’d forget he’d ever been so amazingly stupid. Of course, then his dumb-ass self would probably get amnesia and just try all over again. Because he was an idiot.


	2. Phase 2: Research

Peter liked to think of himself as brave. When he first discovered what had happened to him after the bite, he had pushed his limits, had gone far above and beyond what he thought he could do, and became a superhero so awesome he was asked to join the freaking Avengers. Which is why he was disappointed in himself for webbing up all of the stuff in his tiny shitty apartment and moving into a different tiny shitty apartment just to avoid Wade.

Well, that and he needed a roommate. Being a poorly paid intern crushed under startlingly huge amounts of student loan debt meant that Peter wasn’t just broke, he had negative amounts of money. Every last cent he got from Stark’s internship went to tuition or Aunt May, and every last thing he earned at the Bugle went to paying rent. In Manhattan. He really should just move to Jersey, but come on, Jersey. Plus all of the good crime happened in the city.

Not that crime was good.

And capturing bad guys didn’t make him feel good.

It was just his responsibility.

Right.

Off topic. Whatever. As soon as he got back to his apartment after the worst proposal ever in the history of time, Peter started packing. As he gathered his stuff, he realized that Wade contributed more than his fair share to his lifestyle. The couch was a slick red monstrosity of a chaise-longue that Wade had bought at an estate sale from a guy he’d unalived, the bed and frame had simply shown up one day because Wade said he’d always wanted to try water-bed sex, the fridge was full of food Wade bought so that Peter would cook for him. The list went on. Everything Peter owned in the world fit inside four boxes. When he shut the door behind himself the place was still completely furnished.

Like the coward it turned out he actually was, Peter spent the night squatting in an abandoned building. It was still blackened from the fire that drove out most of the tenants. He showered in the locker room of the gym facility nestled away in Stark Tower for employee use. Interns were technically employees anyway, he was 90% sure. Tony raised an eyebrow at his still wet hair when he came into the lab, but no one else seemed any the wiser.

Luckily he was on a month to month lease so at least he didn’t have to pay extra for breaking it. There was no way he’d get the deposit back though. Wade bled out on the floor too many times, the stains were untouchable. For months, Adam, a guy in his biochem lab had been begging for anyone to be his roommate because he couldn’t afford the rent on his own, so off Peter went to provide that service. 

The extra room Peter was moving into had a shower and toilet curtained off in one corner, so he reasoned it was kind of like having his own ensuite. It also had window access to the fire escape so he could sneak out at night without Adam seeing him.

“So uh, I know it’s not much, but it’s what I got.” Adam had said with a shrug when Peter showed up with his measly belongings.

“No, it’s great. You’re really saving my life here. I can’t afford much on my own.”

“Preaching to the choir. What made you move so fast? Relationship troubles?”

“Something like that. I’ve got this month’s rent ready.”

Peter handed over a couple hundred dollars worth of sad crumpled bills. He was sorry to see it go. If he was sneaky he could probably get both breakfast and lunch in the employee dining room at Stark’s tower seeing as how he’d have no food money for another three weeks. Plus there was a nice old lady in midtown who offered Spider-Man free food. Maybe he’d actually take her up on the offer. He shook that thought clear. It was wrong to accept money or gifts for helping people. Stupid morality.

The first thing he set up was his computer and wi-fi. He thanked his lucky stars that Stark insisted on providing all Avengers with the kind of internet access that would make the NSA weep.

Peter had to figure out what went so terribly wrong. How could he have spent nine months falling head over heels for a guy that didn’t even realize they were in a relationship? There was only one way to find out.

Science!

The parts of Peter’s life not taken up by crime fighting were taken up by research and experimentation. It was familiar, comforting, and it would help him get the answers he needed.

Step 1; Identify the Problem/Question. He had a shit ton of those, but only one would he make official.

_Were Deadpool and I in a romantic relationship?_

Step 2; Research.

Peter accessed the files for the last three Avengers’ fights that Deadpool had been present for. Okay, so it wasn’t the most unbiased data subset, and he really shouldn’t have had access to the files in the first place, but it’s not like he was a creeper who recorded his every conversation with Wade for later reference.

Except for that once. But there wasn’t a whole lot of talking in that video.

Armed with markers and poster board he’d nabbed from school he began taking notes and charting. The results were extremely disheartening. He’d started with what seemed to him to be the most obvious indicator of a relationship; Wade saying I Love You.

It turned out that Wade said ‘I Love You’ a lot. To everyone. He didn’t even say it to Peter the most. According to the meticulous bar graph he’d created, Captain America had earned the most ‘I Love You’s. Peter didn’t even come in second place. He was in third behind the Hulk. The only glaring gut wrenching difference was that Peter was the only member of the team who said, ‘I love you too’ in response. That was embarrassing.

He even went so far as to put the recordings through a sound system to analyze inflection and intonation. No differences. Peter wasn’t getting a softer tone or more emotion. When comparing audio recordings they overlapped nearly perfectly. The only thing it showed was that it was in fact Wade saying it every time.

After careful analysis of the five categories Peter laid out on the chart the only one that Peter lead was Terms of Endearment. And even in that he had only a razor thin edge over Cable. Peter idly wondered if Wade was sleeping with him too. Probably.

As Peter was thumping his head against the desk in a futile attempt to knock some common sense into himself his barely-a-smart-phone beeped with a message.

DP: SOMEONE ROBBED UR APARTMENT!!!! :(:(:(:(

The next text was filled with katana emojis and blood drops.

PP: No, I just moved out. This month’s rent is paid so you can choose to move your stuff out or keep renting it. And since when is there a katana emoji?

DP: I know ppl. Y R U gone?

Instead of answering, Peter kept trying to pound the stupidity out of his head. Then he resolutely blocked Wade’s number. He ignored a call from Aunt May because the thought of telling her to put the ring back in its hidey-hole was still excruciating. What the hell was he supposed to do next? The answer of course was to put his suit on and go swinging into the night. It would have worked better if it hadn’t been the middle of the afternoon. If any crime happened in the middle of the afternoon it was the big stuff. World ending, total domination, I want you to know I’m here type of stuff. If there wasn’t anything obvious going on then there just wasn’t anything at all.

As he swung lazily through Hell’s Kitchen he realized that his attempt to take his mind off his self-inflicted shame was probably costing him money. He was purposely going slow to enjoy the weightless feel on the top of each arc before gravity flung out to tug him back to Earth, but that meant giving looky loos a chance to take some photos that Jameson would probably end up buying. Damn, he couldn’t even swing without it coming back to bite him in the ass.

From somewhere in his suit his STARKPhone (his work phone, as he called it) began to vibrate. Very pointedly Peter just kept swinging.

Tony’s face popped into his line of vision. “Kid! Answer your damn phone when I call!”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAH!” He narrowly missed an overpass. “What The Fuck! It’s Saturday! I’m not your intern today! And how did you get my suit to display images? And get my phone to answer itself? What if I had been naked? Or peeing? Tony, are you trying to see me pee?”

That made Tony roll his eyes, hard, which was kind of the point anyway, “All I can see is your face, dumbass, and I’m forcing you to take this call because freakin’ Deadpool has called me 17 times in a row asking about you. That is not a hyperbole, by the way, when I say 17 I mean 17. He even went all Romeo and Juliet on me and said he’d cut off body parts until I called to check up on you. His body parts, not mine, just to be clear.”

“So?”

“So he said he’d do it in my lobby. And then he was in my lobby. Now you tell me, What The Fuck, Parker?”

Peter plunked down on a rooftop. “I couldn’t afford my old apartment any more, so I moved. I didn’t tell Wade until after it happened because he would have offered to pay or something but now he’s got to figure out where to put his stuff. That’s probably why he’s freaking out.”

No way was he ever going to admit what happened. If Wade didn’t think they were dating, the rest of the group had no idea either. They probably just saw him as a fawning idiot. Peter planned on lying through his teeth all damn day on that one. Tony looked completely skeptical.

“You need a place to stay? You know everyone is welcome at the Tower, rent free.”

“Rent free does sound really, really nice, but the constant overhead surveillance? Not so much.”

“How much am I paying you? Is it not enough? And you know F.R.I.D.A.Y. can duck out if you ask.”

“Yeah, but she’ll still be listening. It’s creepy, Stark, just plain creepy. Be honest, you’ve had her talk dirty to you at least once. How can I sleep in a place being watched over by someone who makes the tissues appear when you’re having ‘alone time’?”

“You know what, forget I just asked you if you wanted a raise-”

“You would offer me a raise?”

“No, I just asked if you’d want one, but now that you’re being mean about F.R.I.D.A.Y. you can just pretend it never happened and come get this Merc off my hands.”

“Yeah, I uh--” he cleared his throat to force down an unexpected well of tears, “I’m not going to do that. Just order him some food and tell him he has to eat it outside.”

Tony’s eyebrows about shot up into his hair, but Peter remained firm.

“Seriously though. Are you okay kid?”

“Of course!” Peter answered as brightly as he could, “I’m the Amazing Spider-Man! I’m always good!”

“That would be more convincing if you didn’t occasionally get possessed by an alien black goo.”

“It’s not a possession! Venom is a symbiote! I’m hanging up now!”

It was easier said than done, but he managed to disable the projection equipment and turn the phone off relatively quickly. If he didn’t want to end up breaking down in front of the group, crying like an infant over the break-up that wasn’t a break-up, he’d need a plan. Like, a good plan. Not hiding in a new dank apartment pretending like he didn’t want to move into swanky digs that didn’t smell like the neighbor was cooking cabbage soup all day every day. What he needed, was more science.


	3. Phase 3: Hypothesis

Armed with infographics of the charts he’d compiled from the battle recordings Peter set out to figure out exactly what had gone wrong and why. What about their non-relationship had made Peter believe he was the sole owner of Wade’s affection? What had made him fall for the Merc in the first place?

They were ostensibly very different people. Peter didn’t exactly keep his place uncluttered, but it wasn’t dirty. Deadpool could live in absolute filth with no issue. Peter had a very Due North moral compass, where as Wade’s seemed to spin in endless circles that occasionally sliced people’s heads off. Heck, objectively Wade wasn’t even that attractive, what with the way the tumors shifted constantly under his wrinkled skin, and yet Peter was so very attracted to him. Perhaps Peter was just hungry for affection? After all, one of the properties he calibrated for was ‘Casual Touches’ and it turned out that Wade loved to touch people. Hugs, kisses, gentle brushes of hands on faces, really any skin to latex suit caresses were standard with him.

Too standard, as it turned out. Wade petted everyone constantly, not just Peter. Nothing was ever just for Peter. So what convinced him he was special?

Step 3: Form a Hypothesis.

_Hypothesis: I am ‘in love’ with Wade, who does not love me back. What I believed to be a monogamous relationship was in fact a casual ‘friends with benefits’ relationship with Wade, who does not requite my feelings._

Peter wrote it out in very small letters in light pencil on the back of one of his posters, not in the computerized data. Hypothesis could be subject to change after experimentation after all. He looked at his phone and realized he was going to be so late to class if he didn’t hurry up. He grabbed everything he could and decided that since he was having such a crappy week he was allowed to treat himself to swinging to school, just stealthily.

Two muggings and a stabbing later he was waaaay later than he intended. There was no point in trying to sneak in late, Dr. Octavius basically had eyes in the back of his head.

“Thanks for joining us, Mr. Parker,” he said with his back still to the door as Peter slunk in.

“Sorry, Sir.”

“Don’t tell me you’re sorry, just start working on these differentials. I’m going to keep you late for lab to make up this time.”

“Yes, Sir,” Peter choked out. Staying late meant being late to the Bugle, which meant less money if any, which meant less sleep and probably being late to his internship in the morning. He couldn’t wait to be uber rich so he wouldn’t have to do a billion things at once. Maybe he could get Tony to adopt him. Lord knew Tony had the money to take him on, and despite the fact that Peter was an adult, he totally still qualified as an orphan anyway. As Peter dreamed of the high life, the class came to an end without him getting much of anything done.

“Peter!” Octavius called after him. “Are you doing okay? It’s not like you to come in late, not have your work done, and daydream in class. Your focus is one of your best traits.”

“Yeah, I just moved. Yesterday. It was busy. Didn’t get anything productive done. Must still be sleepy from the exertion.”

“Ah,” his mentor nodded knowingly. “Relationship troubles, eh?”

“Oh My God! First Adam, now you? Is there like a sign on my forehead?”

“Kind of. You wear your heart on your face kid. Want to talk about it?”

“Not really. And why do people keep calling me kid? I’m 20!”

Octavius chuckled. “The curse of having a young face. You look like you’re in middle school and someone just kissed your best girl.”

Peter thought he’d been doing a good job of schooling his features, but that made his head hang low. “That’s the problem, I kind of think someone did.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to bring up sore topics.” Octavius gave him a sideways one armed hug-esque squeeze. It made him feel immeasurably better. “Come on, let’s get to the lab. Some good old fashioned particle physics ought to cheer you up.”

As Dr. Octavius put on his mechanical arm suit(which always creeped Peter out)he started putting together the laser they’d be working with that day.

From off to his side he heard the voice of another Stark intern. “Oh hey Peter.” 

“Hey Miguel, what brings you to the lab today? I thought you mostly worked the middle of the week?”

“Yeah.” Miguel nervously ran his fingers through his short black hair.

“I’ve just been trying to get in some extra hours in the lab before the semester ends. You never know when the funding will dry up.” he offered with a broad smile, pushing his black-rimmed hipster glasses up his nose.

“Ah the glory of academia, constantly begging for money.”

“And attention. Everyone wants to be the first to publish because we secretly want to be science rock stars.”

Peter laughed and nodded. “Being the next Neil Degrasse Tyson. That’s the dream. Rolling knee deep in awkward science chicks.”

“Oh!” Miguel looked at him quizzically. “Uh, I apologize for how this sounds but I didn’t think you were, uh…”

“Interested in science chicks? I roll both ways, but if I’m going to date a girl I like a little nerdy in the mix.”

“And for guys?”

Peter chuckled darkly. “Yeah, I have been known to go for the awkward when it comes to them too. Seems like well adjusted individuals are pretty much the only kind I avoid.”

Well adjusted definitely didn’t fit Wade, but awkward? Good Lord. No one could clear a room with a bad joke like he could. Deadpool was liable to say things that would make the whole room feel so insanely awkward that an Avengers party once broke up at 8:30 because Peter had dragged his red suited suitor along. After that Tony banned Wade from arriving at any party until Tony was drunk enough to be cool with it, which was pretty darn drunk.

Peter realized he’d gone off into daydream land so he made his excuses to start concentrating on the equipment instead of trying to keep himself engaged in a conversation. The hours passed quickly once he delved into the work. Science had always been oddly comforting to Peter. He liked the routine and the fact that it had expected consequences, cause and effect. Even when things went wrong, which inevitably happened in every lab, the results could still be reliably recreated. The variables analyzed. New outcomes achieved only through precise measured change. It was so soothing.

“Pete!” He looked up from double checking some equations to see the Professor by the light switch. Only Peter was still at his desk.

“Crap! What time is it?”

“Only 4, but everyone else is gone for the night. Get out and enjoy yourself. You’re young, it’s a Friday afternoon. Go let loose and relax. Have some fun, get in some trouble,” Octavius said with a wink.

“Maybe someday!” Peter called out as he rushed out the door.

As he had predicted before his day had even really begun, he was late to the Bugle.

“Parker! Get your lazy good for nothing butt in here! You’d better have some pictures for me and they had better be the best damn pictures you’ve ever brought me or I’m firing you for real this time! We go to print in less than an hour!” Jameson had him running to his office within seconds of setting foot in the door. There were few things Peter hated more than being in Jonah’s office. It smelled like stale cigarette smoke and the walls were lined with old front covers with headlines such as ‘Masked Menaces Summon Monsters in Manhattan!’ and other nonsense.

“Yes, uh, yes Sir. I have some prints for you to look at if I could just…” he pointed at Jonah’s computer.

“Just what, son? Why don’t you just say things? Why must everyone pause like we’re supposed to guess what they want? Like I’m some friggin’ Houdini who reads minds.”

“The computer, Sir. My photos are online. I need to download them for you.”

“And you think I’m going to let you touch my computer for that? Start using that brain everyone says you actually have. Send me your best ones and I’ll let you know if you’ll still have a job by tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

They blinked at each other. 

“Was there anything else or...?”

“Damn it Parker! Photos! Go get me those photos! If I wanted someone to stand around and stare at me all day I’d get a new wife. Jesus. Kids these days.”

Peter scrambled over to an unoccupied desk -there was no point telling Jameson that he didn’t have his own desk- and sifted through the shots he’d gotten that week. It was yet another reminder that he was single. Wade tended to pop up a lot, photo-bombing wherever he could, in the most outrageous poses possible. 

Peter tried to avoid vanity, but even he had to admit that some of the shots were pretty good. A black and white photo of the Hulk with wide eyes holding a tiny mewling kitten might have gotten on the front page at a different paper, but this was the land of trashy tabloids, where only despicable headlines ripping the Avengers apart were acceptable. He found a photo of himself picking up a car, looking like he was about to throw it. He’d been setting up shots when a drunk driver plowed into the side of a car. Peter caught the car and gently set the family within down on the ground, but the photo out of context made him look like an absolute lunatic. Jameson would love it.

He sent several, just for comparison’s sake, but he knew which one Jameson would pick.

“Parker! These photos are piles of vomit!” Jameson screamed at him, then quietly told his receptionist to send the photo with the car down to printing. “I’m only paying you 75% of normal.”

“80%!” Peter brazenly called back. Jonah blinked hard. No one negotiated, but Peter was feeling reckless.

“Fine, but I’m holding you to your exclusivity contract!”

“Yes, Sir!”

With finally a free moment to sit back and think Peter realized that though he’d worked all day he was amped on too little sleep and too much emotion. Maybe it was a good night to go out.


	4. Phase 4: Design an Experiment

It was not a good night to go out. Peter felt like sludge in the morning. No, worse than sludge. What was worse than sludge? Maybe that weird gravel filled sludge that cut across your knees when you fell into it. Or gravel filled sludge with bits of broken glass and old hot dogs mixed in. It was probably a hangover. A mythical thing that Peter had never had before because he didn’t drink before the ‘incident’ and couldn’t really get drunk after.

Thor’s Asgardian Bilge-snipe Spit (he was assured it was just a title and not really what was in the flask) took care of that. As Peter blearily stumbled from his bed in search of water (please God let there be water) he briefly considered bringing the stuff into the lab for analysis because there was no way it was an actual alcohol and was probably just straight poison for mortals.

“Oh Lord what fools these mortals be.” He mumbled to himself as he swallowed water from the sink with some Aspirin. As he attempted to combat his nausea with water he wondered if it even metabolized the same way alcohol did. He was treating it like a normal hangover, which was mainly a dehydration issue. What if the byproducts reacted with NSAIDs?

“Fuck it. If I die, I die.” he mumbled to himself, walking back into his tiny room.

“No dying!”

Peter yelped and jumped. Just a little. Onto the ceiling. Wade’s face was pressed against the floor, his body lying half on and half off the bed. 

Peter dropped back down and rubbed at his face with his hands. “We slept together, didn’t we.”

“Only literally. You wouldn’t let me tap that ass last night. One of the boxes in my brain said it’s not okay to take advantage of people while they’re inebriated. Does it still count if you’ve had sex before? Because we have totally boinked before.”

As Wade spoke he slithered forward fully onto the floor. “Ow. I don’t know where you got that shit from, but I’m gonna need to place an order. Do Ass-guardians take checks?”

“How can you say you don’t know where it comes from, then mention Asgard? And who the fuck still uses checks?”

“Me! Though not having a Driver’s License makes things more difficult. People just won’t believe you’re a hideous roiling mass of flesh under a mask until you show them, and then sometimes after you show them they won’t let you have the tacos you unalived some motherfuckers for. It’s an unjust system.”

Peter crawled into the covers on his bed because his head hurt like he’d been wall-slammed by the Green Goblin.

“What stores even accept checks anymore?”

“Anywhere 90 year old ladies would shop, which covers basically everywhere I go except for the taco stands. Damn them and their withholding tasty tasty meats because they think my checks will bounce! I mean, come on, it was one time!”

Peter closed his eyes and nodded sleepily. “You do love antiquing.”

“Old shit is the best! Speaking of which,” Peter felt the mattress dip as Wade pressed in against his back. It was warm and familiar. “Do you want to go out to Jersey with me tomorrow and get some stuff?”

Peter stole an arm to wrap around himself, sinking back into the heat of the spandex, before reality caught up with his hangover-addled brain.

“Wait, WHAT THE FUCK?!” Peter bolted out of bed. “Wade, what the fuck are you doing here? We broke up. I’m not going to go anywhere with you, and you shouldn’t be here. How did we even end up together last night? I went out alone.”

“It’s actually a funny story, see, I kept texting you and getting no reply, so I figured you might have blocked me, which, ouch. Anywhooo-”

“You know what, I don’t have time for this.” Peter ignored the thumping of his heartbeat in his temple. “I don’t know what time it is but I’m sure I’m late for my internship and Tony isn’t half as forgiving as school, even though he’s not exactly Mr. Punctuality himself.”

“Should I see myself out or do you want me to lay in bed all day and think of you?” Deadpool laid on his side, one hip popped suggestively. All Peter could think of was how many other people had seen him like that.

“See yourself out. My roommate is probably gone already, but if he isn’t don’t let him see you.” Peter shut the door with more force than was strictly necessary. He could hear Wade saying something on the other side, but there was a pretty high chance he was talking to the voices in his head.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

As Peter sauntered toward the tower, trying to will his body into not being sore, he considered what he remembered of the night before. He had gone out to a gay bar with every intention of hooking up with a random stranger for his very first one night stand. As far as he could remember it started very well. His radioactively toned abs earned him more than his fair share of looks, his not complete lack of rhythm meant he’d had more than one eager suitor, and the fierce make out session with a striking brunet should have sealed the deal.

The problem, as it turned out, was that Peter just wasn’t a one night stand kind of a guy. Getting naked was intimate. Not to mention that his life demanded that all newcomers needed to be scrutinized. In the end he just hadn’t been able to pull the trigger and actually take the guy home. Everything after he said goodnight to the man was a little hazy. Peter pulled out his phone to check for clues. They were staring him blatantly in the face.

Wade had started texting him from a new number. Peter, idiot that he was, didn’t figure out it was Wade until the flask of Asgardian mead on his hip insured he was too drunk to tell him to fuck off for being a douchebag cheater. Peter whistled low as he read through the texts. Wade had been hitting on him. Hard.

His Spidey-sense went off just in time to keep him from walking into Tony’s back. He hadn’t even realized he was in the lab yet.

“Kid, what exactly am I paying you for? Your professor called me yesterday to say you showed up for class late asking if I could cut you some slack since I’m clearly overworking you, but now here you are showing up to my place late clearly not coming from school. If I’m going to get chewed out for doing something, it had damn well better be for something I’m actually doing.”

Peter sighed as he changed into his white lab coat. “Sorry, just had a lot on my plate lately. I won’t be late again.”

“Well… good.” Tony turned back to whatever project he was working on. Something involving lasers. Why was it always lasers? “Why do you always put a lab coat on anyways? No one else does that.”

“No else is working with polymers with exceptional adhesive properties either. I need to increase the tensile strength on my… polymer. It hasn’t been able to support more than 200 lbs per strand. Using more strands costs time and efficiency. If I can just get the tensile strength at a high enough ratio without compromising the adhesive properties or the flexibility-”

“Blah Blah Blah Chemistry Blah Blah Blah. I’m an electrical and mechanical engineer and programmer. I don’t care about your sticky stuff. That didn’t sound as terrible in my head as it does out loud.”

“It never does.” Peter mumbled. He stared at the notes he had written his own damn self and couldn’t decipher them. His brain was swimming back and forth between the work he was doing in the other lab and this one and not finding the delineating line. The words on the page were melting together.

He startled when a hand settled on his shoulder.

“You’ve been reading the same line for 45 minutes. It’s coffee time. Does coffee affect you? Because I’m pretty sure even if no other stuff has, the kind I buy will. If I didn’t know any better I’d say you were hungover. You have that soggy bloodshot thing going on. I should know, used to be my calling card.”

He let Tony pull him away from the notes he’d be staring at toward the slick shiny elevator located pretentiously right in the middle of the lab.

“And here I thought your calling card was the pretty pretty princess outfit you wore.”

“Dammit! Who showed you the photos? Was it Rhody? Don’t answer that, of course it was him. Pep has too much honor to betray me like that.”

“That particular shade of pink actually went very well with your skin tone.”

“You know, I thought so too.”

Tony lead them to the 17th floor where a heavenly smelling little cafe sat.

“Of course you have your own baristas,” Peter scoffed.

“I have good taste. So, now’s the part where you tell me what’s been going on and I act concerned. Then, problem gets resolved, I get my good little worker bee back, and everyone is happy.”

“Right. Happy.” 

He probably should have said it with more enthusiasm. Maybe then Tony wouldn’t be looking at him with so much pity. “Just don’t worry about it. I’m coming up with a plan. I just need to hammer out the details is all.”

Tony shrugged. “You want to play secret agent that’s fine with me. Just know that I have the best espionage equipment on the planet. I’ll give you one week to pull out of your funk before I start using it to figure out what’s got your suit up your crack and start fixing it for you.”

“I think I can get it under control in a week.” he answered with no conviction.

“Good. Now leave. That science won’t study itself.”

Getting called out twice in two days by different mentors was not Peter’s idea of fun. If he was going to get through the rest of his life he’d have to rid himself of his feelings for Wade. It was time for the next step.

Step 4: Design an experiment to test the hypothesis.

If Wade truly didn’t love him, as Peter now highly suspected, then he wouldn’t have any trouble with Peter dating other people. Or rather, any people. If he’d spent the entirety of their relationship thinking they weren’t monogamous then he shouldn’t have any problem with Peter going out on dates now.

The proposition was easy enough, like any bad romance movie Peter would go out on a date, then the next time he saw Wade he’d casually mention the date and carefully catalog his reactions. If there was no reaction he’d wait a few days and claim he and his date had escalated things, until bit by bit he’d announce he was in a relationship. If none of that bothered Wade his hypothesis would be proven correct and he could safely move on with his life having definitively figured out what went wrong.

This was of course the minute everything went to hell.

When Peter’s spidey-sense kicked in it always felt like time slowing down. Without even consciously reacting, his body flooded with adrenaline giving him the ability to sense and react to whatever was about to happen. On that day it was a solid metal object coming at the window of the room they were in. Peter was able to get a metal tray into his hands before the object got to the window. In between heart beats he watched as it crashed through the window. Tony and the few other lab-rats around started ducking as Peter swung the tray. The object, rebounding off Peter’s tray, flew back the way it came, exploding in mid-air.

“Suit up?” Peter asked as Tony looked out the window for a culprit.

“Suit up.”


	5. Phase 5: Collecting Data

Into the night they chased after a figure that they were never able to catch up with. Tony’s pool of less elite interns were sent to collect whatever pieces of the bomb they could find for analysis. Closed-circuit camera footage was analyzed for any sign of who had tried to destroy the building, but there were no clues beyond a flash of red. With nothing to go on they had called off the search not long after dusk and Peter returned to his room. He decided to walk in through the front door, which forced him to make some awkward chit-chat with his new roommate.

After general pleasantries and the standard, ‘how was your day?’ crap, Adam finally cleared his throat and said, “Uh, is there an Avenger in your room? I mean it’s cool and I won’t tell anybody, but I’d kind of like to know. Just in case we get targeted, or whatever.”

“There shouldn’t be, I’ll just- Why don’t I just have a quick peek?”

Not only was Wade still in his room, but his room now contained most of the stuff he’d left at the old apartment, big red couch and all, crammed into the minuscule space.

“You’re back!” Wade presented him with six burritos, their bottom halves wound together with aluminum foil so that Wade could hold them all at the same time in one outstretched hand. “Hungry?”

Peter left without a word, closing the door behind him.

“So, yeah there’s an Avenger in my room. I’ll get rid of him, don’t worry. I’ll just tell him he’s not welcome back.”

Adam gaped at him. “Are there going to be other Superheros in the house? Are you sleeping with him? I mean, none of my business, but that’s pretty bad-ass if you are. Can you introduce me to Black Widow? How’d you meet him?”

Adam stood on his tiptoes, straining to see past Peter as if he could get a glimpse of Deadpool through the closed door.

“I’m an intern for Stark. Sometimes ‘special’ people stop by. I was sleeping with him, but not anymore. I could introduce you to Nat, but she’s dating the Hulk and trust me you don’t want any part of that.”

“Dude.” Adam said in awe. “You’re like the coolest guy I know.”

Peter felt a blush creep up. “Trust me, I’m really not. I may have slept with a dude in a red suit, but the Avengers don’t really like him and he cheated on me.”

“Man, that sucks. Who’d he cheat on you with?”

For some inane reason the only answer Peter was willing to give was, “Spider-man.”

Adam looked impressed. “If someone you date can date Spider-man, that puts you on that level too.”

Adam held out his fist for a pound. Peter reluctantly returned the gesture.

“I’m going to go kick him out now.” he said awkwardly after a moment that lasted too long.

Wade was lounging on the water bed tummy down with a magazine in his hand, occasionally flopping a foot to create waves that sent him into fits of giggles. The burritos bobbed along with him. Peter’s day had been too long for him to turn down the food. It was kind of hard to get one burrito out of the bundled monstrosity though.

“Wade. I think we need to talk.” Peter mumbled through a mouthful of cilantro rice.

“Yes! Talking sounds good! I just read this very interesting article about tattoos called ‘Trash Polka’. Do you think I can get tattoos? More importantly, could I pull this off?” The picture he turned over just looked like a mess of black and red to Peter.

Peter snatched the glossy pages away. “You know what? I’m tired. I’ve had a sixteen hour day after a night of heavy drinking, my first night of heavy drinking, and I just want to go to sleep.”

“Oh man, that sounds great!” Wade piled underneath the covers.

“You are not invited to sleep here. Ever again.”

“Ah, don’t want to hear me snoring? I get it.” Wade planted a kiss on his cheek then leapt out of the window before Peter could protest.

“God damn, that man is so fucking confusing.” Peter smacked his shin on the corner of that stupid couch, because of course he did.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Step 5: Collect Data

The next day was not great either. He had slept very well on the water bed after guiltily jacking off to the smell of Wade that lingered on the bed. The fact that he felt the need to do it again in the morning was the main reason why his day was not starting well.

Especially because it was Experiment Day. Peter just had to find someone to take on a date. Flipping through Tinder trying to find someone who wanted to go on a chaste date was the other reason why his day was going badly. How many dick pics could one guy stomach in a day? He was kind of amused to see how many of them were clearly taken from Google as they were used by several different guys.

“Hey Peter!” Miguel greeted him brightly as he walked in the door.

“Hey, back for more exciting physics?” Peter gave a large fake smile and thumbs up and slung his messenger bag across the back of the too-low chair at his desk.

Miguel laughed. “I kind of like the physics.”

“Sadly, physics has kind of been the highlight of my days for a while now.”

Miguel cleared his throat. “How’s the new apartment working out for you? Adam seems to think it’s going pretty well.”

“Yeah, it’s been okay.” Peter sat down at his desk to sift through the papers he’d left there. Despite it being a bad morning he was feeling more focused than he had in days. Maybe he’d actually get some of his work done.

“Cool. Cool. I’ll just,” Miguel awkwardly jerked a thumb at his own desk, “be over here.”

Peter smiled nicely and dove into the math that awaited him. Or at least he tried to, until Octavius came up to him.

“Would you please put that boy out of his misery?”

“Who out of what misery?” Peter asked, not really looking up from his work.

“Has anyone told you that for a smart guy you can be pretty dumb?”

“Honestly? Yes,” Peter sighed and swiveled around. “What am I being stupid about this time?”

Octavius perched on the edge of Peter’s desk and looked around. “Miguel, Peter. The poor boy blushes every time he talks to you. He’s been beating around the bush asking if you’re attracted to guys for weeks now. He comes in on his off hours when he knows you’ll be here for heaven's’ sake. I’m not saying you should go out with him if you’re not interested, but just let him know one way or another. It’s getting awkward to watch.”

Peter was sure his eyes widened comically. That was followed swiftly by feeling dumb as hell indeed, because looking back at the last few days he saw so many indications that his professor was right. The awkward questions were probably awkward flirting. “You’re right, I’ve been stupid. Although, not the stupidest thing I’ve overlooked this month. Thanks for the heads up.” 

Octavius smiled and wandered off. Peter peered at Miguel out of the corner of his eye. The man certainly wasn’t bad looking. He was smart enough to work in Oct’s lab, which said a lot. Peter didn’t know a whole lot of his personality beyond that, but wasn’t that what dating was for? But was it worth risking an office romance if it didn’t work out? Despite Miguel being objectively attractive, Peter just wasn’t attracted to him, at least he wasn’t at that moment. That was probably for the best. It meant Peter could do one date, claim no chemistry and still have it fit flawlessly into his plan. Miguel couldn’t get too attached with one date, right?

When Peter saw how Miguel’s face lit up when Peter asked him out for a dinner he realized that maybe it was more than a tad selfish to just go on a date for his experiment and not even try. 

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

It was with newfound resolve that Peter walked into the bar, it was kind of quiet and classy, more upscale than Peter should have suggested he could spring for. Before the menu showed up and confirmed his every monetary fear he had already decided water was all he could afford to drink.

“Am I late?” Miguel asked, slipping onto the tall stool across from Peter.

“Not at all.” Peter’s companion was dressed up in a way he hadn’t seen before, slacks and a vest with a hint of tie popping out at the top. Peter felt way underdressed in his outfit that was best described as ‘from the clean pile’. “I barely had time to order this water before you got here.”

“Great!”

They chit-chatted mostly about physics while looking over their menus. The conversation wasn’t hugely stimulating, but it flowed easily enough as they waited for their food to arrive. Just before it did Peter’s senses started that tell-tale tingling at the base of his neck.

“Will you excuse me?” he asked, and headed off to the restroom, taking stock of everyone in the room as he went. The culprit wasn’t hard to spot.

“Bob, what are you doing here?”

“Me? I’m not doing anything here just having a beer. I didn’t know you were here! How is your evening going here with Mr. Alvarez here?” the extraordinarily plain looking man was sweating bullets, shifting on his stool at the bar, where he sat facing Peter’s table.

“Bob, if you didn’t expect me to be here how’d you know the name of my date?”

Bob’s eyes skittered around nervously. “We go way back? My wife is friends with his Mom?”

Peter rolled his eyes. “That would be more convincing if you were telling me instead of asking me. By the way, when you’re nervous you repeat words too. You said ‘here’ about three times too many. Just a tip.”

Bob picked at the sleeves of his ill-fitting sports coat. “Don’t tell Mr. Wilson, okay? He said I’m supposed to learn how to be stealthy if I’m going to be of any use and you’re so good at spotting people so you’d be good to follow.”

He looked so dejected, even more so than his normal kicked puppy face. Peter put a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, why don’t you call your wife and invite her down for a drink? Your cover’s been blown anyway, when was the last time you spent time together?”

“Yeah,” Bob said brightly. “I guess that’s a good idea. Thanks Pete!”

“It’s Peter.” He actually did head to the restroom before going back to Miguel.

“Friend of yours?” Miguel asked when Peter was seated again.

“Sort of? He’s a friend of a friend, waiting for his wife to show up.”

“Ah. I have to say I was wondering if he was an old flame.”

“Ouch,” Peter pretended to wince. “Emphasis on the old if you think we were a thing. He’s really really not my type and I’m definitely not his either.”

Miguel leaned in close giving his lips a small lick. “What would you say your type is?”

“ME!” Wade’s voice boomed loud in the quiet din of the bar. Peter just hung his head, not bothering to turn around. “Hey ya! I’m Deadpool! You may know me as the amazing mercenary you see on TV who cuts motherfuckers’ heads off when they need one less life to live!”

A very bewildered and a little frightened Miguel took Wade’s proffered hand.

“Say, those are some very soft hands you have. Do you lotion up when you whack the weasel? I hear it’s the best way to get that baby soft smooth finish.”

“Wade!” Peter hissed, “What are you doing here?”

“Well you see, I have Bob’s phone tapped. When he called to invite the old Ball and Chain down for a drink I figured I’d tag along. It’s a good thing too or I wouldn’t have the pleasure of meeting this fine young fellow you have here.”

“Why are you wearing a mask in the bar?” Miguel asked.

“Cancer. Like, a lot of it.”

“Wow, I’m sorry.” Miguel said with real sincerity.

“Thank you!” Wade slid onto a stool. “You know, everyone knows I have cancer, the terminal kind, but after a few years people just stop acknowledging it. To get back to my original point though, I’m Peter’s type. I can say that with confidence because I’m the last guy he had sex with. He proposed to me you know.”

Horror crossed Miguel’s face. “Peter, are you cheating on him with me?”

“NO! I would never- I have never, he’s just… let me start over. Did I propose to him, yes, but he said no! We broke up, I’m moving on, and he’s… eating the appetizers.”

Wade looked up with nachos in, on, and around his mouth. “Wuh?”

Miguel was a mix of annoyed and resigned. “I think this is the part where I say goodnight and the date ends.”

“I’m so sorry, about all of this. Would you be open for a second date? Or a first date redo?”

Miguel looked at the happy Merc still stuffing his face. “Maybe someday, but this is all just too complicated right now. Sorry.” Miguel gave an aborted wave as he shuffled quickly out of the bar.

The nachos were decimated by the time Peter cooled down enough to address Wade.

“What. The. Fuck?”

“Oh come on!” Wade protested, “I didn’t do anything wrong! I didn’t say anything about us being together or that you still love me, I just implied that we used to be together.”

“Showing up in the middle of a date then telling the guy I proposed to you is absolutely ‘doing something wrong’ FYI. In fact, don’t tell anyone ever again that I proposed to you. It was humiliating the first time, I don’t need to relive it.”

“It wasn’t humiliating, it was just a little misguided.”

Peter glared at him. As he opened his wallet to drop what little money he had before leaving as quickly as possible his phone beeped with a message. It was from Tony and all it said was,

Suit up.

With an attached address.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

When Wade showed up within moments of his arrival despite the fact that Peter had swung there he began to suspect he was the one who’d been bugged.

“Man the bomber may be crazy-pants, but that is a lovely glow!” Wade held his hands out as if he could feel the heat coming off of the burning building hundreds of feet away.

“What is he doing here?” Captain Rogers growled. “I thought I said he wasn’t allowed back after the last incident.”

“I heard it too!” Tony raised his hand. “But you also said it about me, so if we’re being fair about it…”

“Fine. I don’t have time for this discussion. Wade,” Captain America turned the full power of his I’m-disappointed-in-you gaze at Wade. “We do not set anything on fire to try and ‘control the blaze’. Am I understood?”

“Sir, yes Sir, Cap’n Tight Pants.” He waggled his eyebrows, “Get it? It’s a Firefly reference.”

Steve blinked at him, then turned to Peter. “Spider-man, if you wouldn’t mind-”

“I would mind. I am not going to be held responsible for him any more.”

The entire platoon looked at him. “What?”

“I can do it!” Squirrel Girl volunteered from the back. Groans were heard from the gathering.

“Speaking of people finding us without being told.” Hawkeye groused. Nat shot an ‘Amen’ back to him.

“We’re here to take down a terrorist,” Rogers said with gravitas, putting an end to the squabbling. “Here in our home city a woman is indiscriminately killing our people, taking innocent American lives while we waste time on this.”

Once properly chastised the group fell in line and went on their assignments.

“I didn’t think it’d be a woman. I can’t believe she calls herself ‘Bombshell’.” Wade whispered in his ear, sliding up from behind him, “I mean, is she trying to be that cliche? I bet she’s blond and thinks she’s soooo clever.”

“That fucking does it.” Peter lost his shit. He slammed Wade into a wall, pinning him there at the throat.

“Look at me, Wade. Really look at me. I thought that we were dating. I thought that we were in love. But you slept with other people. Like it was nothing, like I was nothing. You don’t get to come to my apartment anymore. You don’t get to act like we’re friends, like nothing happened. I get it, okay? You thought you had a sweet orgasm-friends thing going on with me, so you’re trying to get back to being buddies. It’s not going to happen. I don’t want to hang out with you. Not here, not at my place, not in a bar where I’m on a date with a nice guy who actually likes me. You’re going to go your way, and I’ll go mine. Okay?”

“I… I’ve never heard the term orgasm friends before. Did you make that up, or is that a real thing?”

Peter growled in frustration and released Wade before swinging into the fray.

“Stop trying to make Fetch happen! Am I right?” Wade called out after him.


	6. Phase 6: Analysis

“Peter!” Steve called out to him as the smoke cleared. Most of the time there wasn’t actual smoke on the battlefield so much as debris clouds, but The Bombshell, true to name, just loved lobbing bombs.

“Good work Team! Go us!” Peter shouted. Both Hawkeye and Falcon were willing to give him high fives as he ran past to the Captain’s side. He was still kind of psyched to be a part of the Avengers even though he’d been a member for almost two years. He felt useful and only occasionally like a dumbass. Great self-esteem builder.

“What’s up Cap? Considering downtown dining options? May I suggest-”

“I think this belongs to you,” Rogers said gravely, gesturing to the bloody mess at his feet. Parts of Wade twitched on the ground.

“It really doesn’t.” Peter said, staring at the mess.

He wasn’t expecting the puzzled look the Captain gave him. “Would you like me to get someone else to… help? I’m not exactly sure what you do with him when he’s like this.”

Peter sighed as he collected the larger pieces left over into a bag made of webbing, “Not much to do other than let him put himself back together. What happened?”

Steve shrugged. It seemed too normal, so unfitting of a man wearing the American Flag, well Puerto Rican flag really. “He said something about, ‘I saw this on a TV show once’ then swallowed a bomb. Can’t say I understood it.”

“That sounds right.” The thrill of victory bled away, all of the adrenaline washing to the ground.

Once he’d picked up all he could of Wade’s remains, Peter swung away to his new apartment. As carefully as he could he crawled in through the window, only a few drops leaked onto the floor. He made note to clean them up later.

As he lowered the pieces of Wade’s body that were knitting back together in a slosh of crimson filth into the bathtub he came to realize, that this was it. This was the reason why he thought he’d been the single most special person in Wade’s life. At the end of every battle he was the one to pick up the tattered red pieces of the person he loved and nurse him through the suffering back to whole again.

Most of the Avengers weren’t even bothered by Wade’s constant mutilations because they would see him come back together joking the whole time, but what about everyone else? Where were Wade’s numerous other lovers? His phones were intact, lying in the rubble of his suit. Hell, the man bought water resistant phones for that very reason, but they lay silent and still. Surely the others would have seen the footage and been worried too?

But they weren’t worried, they weren't waiting or helping. That left Peter sitting next to a bathtub, covered in viscera, holding the hand of a corpse who probably had no idea he was even there. And it made Peter miss him.

The data wasn’t changing. It was time to move on.

Step 6: Analysis of the data.  
He mindfully disengaged his hand from Wade’s to wipe at his eyes. He had manufactured the idea that they were in a relationship based on a connection he felt when the other party wasn’t even aware of what was going on. There was his data, his analysis, rolled into a heap. He had come to a faulty initial conclusion based on bad logic. Wade had no idea that Peter was the constant by his side, he wasn’t even conscious. He would reanimate with a smile, asking for food, leaving Peter with his gut still clenched in sickening worry.

What if this was the one time he didn’t come back together? What if there was a number buried deep in his cells and when he hit it they wouldn’t come back together again? Peter had worried because he cared, convinced Wade cared too. Peter had been in love, Wade had been in temporary comas.

The hand dangling over the edge of the tub started to twitch in deliberate movements as tendons and muscles took shape around pearly white bone.

“Damn.” Wade, or the bits of his face available, coughed. “What did I eat?… Get it? See it’s funny, because I swallowed a bomb.”

And there Peter was, still being stupidly irrevocably in love. Wade squeezed his hand to let him know that yes, even the Merc with a Mouth knew it was a bad joke in poor taste. Peter kind of wanted to propose to him again.

“I have to go,” he stood up abruptly. Wade tried to follow, so he shushed him back into the tub. “Don’t get up, it’s just a, uh, debrief on what happened. If you get up you’ll have to come with me, and you hate those.”

“I do hate those! You noticed! Does this bath actually function as a bath?”

“Sort of? You’ll get some rust colored water, and it doesn’t get very hot, but after a few minutes it’ll turn clear then you’ve got a decent amount of time before it goes cold. You know how to see yourself out when you’re done.”

Peter fought the urge to kiss his forehead, instead opting to escape back to Stark Tower to hide.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

“Remind me again why I don’t live here?” Peter asked himself as he lounged on a huge leather sofa eating grapes he stole from the fridge of the living quarters.

“You don’t like the fact that a disembodied voice lives in the ceiling, or at least that’s the excuse you always give me.” Tony appeared in a grease stained tank top, the blue light of the arc reactor shining through.

“Stark!” Peter nearly choked on his grape as he sat up. “If I’d known you were home I’d have, well, hidden better. I’ll awkwardly move towards the door. Bye!”

Tony grabbed him by the collar as he tried to slink past, tossing him at a chair next to the kitchen island. “I hate to do this, honestly, I hate feelings, but you clearly need to talk about whatever you and Wade are going through. What’d you fight about this time?”

Bruce, also decked out in his lab gear, appeared in the doorway and headed toward the grapes Peter had left behind. “I’ll admit I’ve been kind of curious myself.” he said.

“We’re not fighting. We’re just- we aren’t together.” Sighing, he rubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands. He knew what questions would come next.

“That dude’s an idiot.” Stark scoffed. “If nothing he’s done so far has made you dump him, what could possibly have been the straw that broke your back?”

“Tony!” Bruce said disapprovingly.

“What?”

“We were never together,” Peter admitted.

Bruce’s brow furrowed down. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means,” Peter sighed again. “that I proposed to Wade and his response was ‘But we aren’t dating and I’m seeing other people’.”

“Holy Shit!” Tony whistled. “That’s a pretty big freaking straw.”

Bruce laid a large warm hand on his back. Peter’s chin quivered, he swiped at his eyes.

“No shit. And now he’s being all confusing. I went on a date and he showed up, with Bob in tow, and interrupted it. That’s total ex-boyfriend behavior right? And he brings me food, and shows up in my apartment. Total wanting me back behavior, except all of my data supports what he said about us not being a couple in the first place, so which one-”

“Data?”

“Data?”

Tony and Bruce asked at the same time, giving each other a quick glance, like they were wondering if they’d heard him correctly.

“Yeah, I, uh, I kind of went through recordings of battles and analyzed some metrics. It’s no big deal, and really not the point.” Damn, he really didn’t want these two award winning scientists judging him for what he’d done in the name of breakup insanity. Once he’d said it out loud he realized how ridiculous the entire idea was.

“What metrics? How many?” Bruce asked. At least he managed to look genuinely interested.

“Five? I looked at how many times he says, ‘I love you’, Terms of Endearment, Casual Touches, Compliments, and Awareness.”

“The fuck is Awareness?” Tony asked as he peeled a banana.

“We really don’t have to go into it. It’s nothing really, this is just a stupid post break-up or non-break-up thing I did to make myself feel better. Spoiler Alert; It did not help. Let’s just drop it.”

Tony side-eyed him. Hard.

“Fine. You know how when you have a crush you follow people with your eyes or you pay attention to what they’re doing more than what other people are doing? I used an algorithm to count how often Wade looked at and for people before, during, and after combat.”

Bruce hummed in contemplation as he popped another grape in his mouth. “If, for example, Wade called someone, ‘My love’ during an encounter, would you count that as an I Love You, or a Term of Endearment?”

“A Term. Why?” Peter’s frustration colored his voice.

Tony cleared his throat, swallowing a bite of banana. “And if he said, ‘You’re the best’, is that a compliment or Term?”

“It’s a compliment. Clearly.” Peter replied. They both made noises. “What, you think that’s the wrong call?”

“Trick question,” Bruce said apologetically. “It’s clearly platonic and therefore has no place in the study.”

Peter hadn’t thought about that, but he was also too annoyed to think about much at the moment.

“Yeah,” Tony seemed to be talking to himself, but he nodded at Bruce. “We’re going to have to take a look at all of the data. Cross reference, check the original source material. All of it.”

“I concur.” Bruce set the grapes down to take out his STARKPhone. “Peter, can you share your final results with me on Google Docs?”

“NO!”

“Oh God,” Tony groaned, “Don’t tell me it’s on paper. Digitize everything! It’s the best way to back-up your work! Speaking of which, how’d you get the video feeds in the first place?”

“I hacked your system.”

“F.R.I.D.A.Y.?”

“Sir, when I figured out who was trying to get in and why, I lowered some firewalls for him. Hope you don’t mind.”

“I do mind, and we’ll be talking about it later, but for now bring up everything you gave to Peter. Oh stop pouting kid, you didn’t really think you hacked me, did you?” Tony waved a hand vaguely in his direction without looking up from the screen now surrounding his head.

“I’m not pouting.” He was. Also, it reminded him why he would never live in the tower. “And I’m not giving you my stuff just so that you can laugh at what a pathetic loser I am for thinking that Wade actually cared about me! Just Let. It. Go.”

Tony put a hand right where his neck met his collar bone, a gesture that always made Tony feel like the father figure he missed so much. “Hey, this isn’t about that. You know what this is about? Peer review. I like data. Bruce?”

“I love data.”

“See? We’re all just a bunch of science guys here. I promise we’re not doing this to make fun of you. We just want to see what you’ve compiled. We’ll make our own set of observations to see what conclusions we come to. You’re way too close to the source material, you might miss something. Now, it’s Google Docs time. Or Google Sheets? What are we talking about?”

“Infographics,” Peter said, resigned to his fate.

“Who doesn’t love a good infographic? We’ll see you back here in the morning.”

And with that he was unceremoniously kicked to the curb while Bruce and Tony mumbled over the information.


	7. Phase 7: Conclusion

Peter moved his feet as slowly as possible on his way to the lab the next day after class. Cruel images of Stark and Banner laughing at him while creating a slideshow of his misery slid through his mind. Walking slowly probably wasn’t such a great idea as it gave his imagination more time to come up with what could be happening to his charts. It was time to get it over with.

If Peter hadn’t known any better, he would have thought from the look of the lab that they were looking at legitimate research. Bruce’s hair was a mess, a pencil clenched in his teeth as he stared at a notebook. He was sitting on a couch while Tony stood, full of reckless energy, looking between the charts and a screen. “I found it!” he shouted to Bruce.

“Excellent!” Bruce took the pencil and started furiously writing notes.

“Found what?” The graphs projected were much nicer than the ones Peter had put together in the heat of the moment. The 3D holographics could be manipulated by hand. They were kind of beautiful, and had obviously taken a lot of work.

“You said that Wade brought you food, right?” Bruce asked, pencil poised to paper. “Was it Mexican food?”

“Yes.” Peter answered cautiously. Bruce crossed something off his list.

“Was it placed together oddly? As if in an arrangement?”

Peter thought back. “Now that you mention it, yeah. There were six burritos held together with foil?”

“Yep, Step 3.” Tony said, showing Bruce his portable screen as he scribbled more notes.

“That is certainly our primary source.”

“Hello! Guy over here. Still out of the loop. About my own research,” Peter pointed at himself. “Would like clarification. Please.”

“First off, calling it your research is going a bit far since you used team footage. Second, you were just plain wrong on most of it-”

“He got 3 of 5 correct, Tony.” Bruce pointed out.

“Fine, you were wrong on 40% of it, and thirdly, you somehow managed to come to the wrong conclusion through bad analysis. I mean honestly, I pay you too much. I’m lowering you to $15 an hour.”

“That would actually be a raise, Sir. A significant one.”

“You’re telling me I pay people less than that? What the hell. F.R.I.D.A.Y? Call Pep and tell her to raise our minimum wage to $15. Thought we did that months ago.”

“You did, Sir, for all employees except for interns.”

“I know they’re not really people, but eh, whatever. Now, Peter, we need to discuss where you went terribly wrong.”

“It wasn’t that wrong,” Bruce contradicted. “Honestly it was kind of impressive coming up with this at all. I handled my break ups… worse than this. I’m thinking of making an app.”

Tony waved him off. “Okay, enough blowing smoke up the kid’s ass. Let’s get down to it. You were spot on with the ‘I love you’ counts, Casual Touches, and Awareness, mainly because they’re completely objective. Your T.O.E. and Compliments were skewed with platonics.”

“My toe?

“T.O.E. Terms of Endearment. Keep up. You counted nicknames as T.O.E.s, you counted Wade mentioning haircuts as compliments. It just doesn’t work. Plus, while your awareness time counts were accurate, you didn’t filter for normal battle strategy. You have to know who’s at what position. If you look at only the pre and post discussions the amount of time spent on you is nearly double anyone else.”

“He stares. A lot,” Bruce nodded. “And even if we went with your original numbers, no tweaking, while you only dominated one category you have by far the lowest overall score with 10. Your nearest competitor is at a 16.”

Peter was still a little confused. “By lowest score you mean you added my ranking? 1st place win for T.O.E, three 2nd place finishes, and one 3rd place?”

“Yep” Tony nodded, “Just like Golf, lowest score wins.”

“So, where’s my cake? Since I won first place I feel like I deserve something. A trophy maybe?”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Millennial. Whatever, your research was crappy so we-”

“It was not crappy. You were praising it two hours ago,” Bruce interjected.

“It needed a lot of tweaking. This is why we don’t work on subject matter we’re this close to. Anyway, after many hours of coffee and some discussions and some voting that may have involved several other Avengers-”

“How many Avengers?” Peter demanded.

“Uh, Steve, Sam, Natasha, Maximoff, whatever, you’re getting off track again-”

“Some of those people didn’t even know my identity!”

“What’s with the interrupting? May raised you better than that. And yeah, they did. Deadass calls you Peter in the heat of battle every time you’re in danger.”

“We added that as a T.O.E. since it’s not what he’s supposed to call you in those situations,” Bruce looked mildly ashamed of being part of the shenanigans.

“Also true, thanks Rage Monster. But then we realized that we were thinking about it wrong. We combined casual touching and compliments into one category, Flirting. Too many touches were to stabilize, check for injury, or ground someone. A majority of compliments weren’t sexual or romantic in nature, so they had to go too. Flirting seems like a very subjective category, but that’s why we needed to convene the committee. Steve wishes the two of you all the best, by the by.”

Tony pressed a few buttons, waved his hand a few times, and four larger than life graphs appeared before Peter. Each one was clearly labeled with what it was, who the top three contenders were in each category and what their scores were.

“As you can see, with these four streamlined categories and more objective vote based results your score is now 6 out of a possible low score of four. The only category you didn’t dominate was, as you know, the ‘I love you’, but you have to admit it’s funny watching Steve blush every damn time.”

“Huh. I’m not sure it disproves my initial hypothesis, but it sure does give me something to think about.” It was gorgeous, the whole thing laid out like that.

Bruce perked way up. “What was your initial hypothesis?”

“That Wade never loved me back and what I thought was a monogamous relationship was ‘friends with benefits’, never intending to end in a real relationship.”

Bruce sprang over to the keyboard at the screen Tony had been using, typed, and printed something. “I think that I can completely disprove that hypothesis with this,” he handed Peter the print-out.

“10 Ways to Win Her Back After a Fight? What the hell is this? I’m not even dating a girl and I’m, honestly I’m a little surprised at you, Bruce. This magazine? Really? Where is your self respect?”

Bruce ignored that entirely. “I thought about what you said about Wade acting strangely, and Nat commented that it sounded like he was following bad dating advice about winning someone back. Read a few.”

“#3 Give Her a Bouquet of NOT flowers. Believe it or not, but not all girls like flowers, but all girls like something. Think about something your girl loves and give her a bouquet of that. It will be refreshing, thoughtful, and show her that you’re a good listener. Try cookies, books, or concert tickets! Make it special for your girl. You’re saying this is why he showed up with that burrito monstrosity?” Peter ran a hand through his hair, “You’re telling me that Wade has been trying to win me back by using tips from a crappy article?”

“Exactly! He may have been under the impression that you weren’t in a relationship at first, but clearly knows better now and is attempting to make amends. He has accepted the premise and is trying to redo the experiment phase.”

“What they’re really trying to say,” Nat leaned in through the doorway, “Is that Wade pulled his head out of his ass. He loves you, he just didn’t let himself believe that you could love him back. So he thought he could keep his distance. Maybe he’s realized that’s not what he really wants.” She was talking about Wade, but staring right at Bruce, who never broke her gaze.

“Well this just got awkward, so I’m going to leave and go find Deadpool.” Peter said, beating a hasty retreat.

Step 7: Come to a Conclusion

_Conclusion: Initial hypothesis may not have been correct. Wade and I have mutual feelings for each other, it just took Wade longer to realize that than was ideal._


	8. Phase 8: Repeat

As every good scientist knows, you have to be able to reproduce your data if you want it to stand up to scrutiny. Peter was now armed with a more thorough data set and a bouquet of tacos.

_New Hypothesis: Wade loves me but has a fucked up sense of self-worth so he didn’t believe I could love him back. With that issue resolved, the proposal experiment could possibly be a success._

That left only one experimental course of action. Propose again. God Dammit. He paced on the roof of a different building than when he first proposed, because he wasn’t that masochistic. If, on the off chance, things went well this time he didn’t want to start their life together on the spot where his emotions were stomped on last time. But this time he had data on his side.

“FOR ME!?!?” Deadpool shrieked when he saw the taco bouquet as he dropped down on the roof from… somewhere. Peter honestly couldn’t tell.

“For you.” Peter confirmed. It had taken quite some doing to make the oddity. Balancing that many meat filled shells without spilling or cracking took quite a bit of effort. And tape. Damn it. Now Wade was eating tape. And coughing some of it back up.

“Whoa, bad Mexican place. It’s time to change restaurants, Baby Boy.”

“Yeah, that was really not their fault. Remember how we talked about inedible vs edible?”

“Hey, the burritos thing I gave you was 100% edible!”

“They were wrapped in aluminum foil.”

“I’ll wrap you in aluminum foil.” Wade wiggled his eyebrows salaciously. Despite how ridiculous the claim was, it actually made Peter a little hot under the collar because if anyone could actually make foil sexy, it would be Wade. It would be insane and inventive in some really avant-garde type way. Now Peter really wanted to know what Wade could do.

“I-uh, yeah, so we’ll be exploring that again later, but in the meantime, I have something I’d like to ask you…”

“Is it about unicorns?”

“What? No. What?”

“Spandex?”

“Still no, pretty sure I have spandex figured out.”

“Are you sure? Because you went from Andrew to Tom pretty quick a while ago. Not sure the fit will be the same in both costumes,” Wade tapped his chin, looking Peter over appraisingly.

“What?”

“Is it about dat ass?” Wade asked cautiously.

“NO! Would you just stop trying to figure out what I’m going to ask you and just let me propose to you again?”

“OOOOOO!!!” Wade squealed, reached into a pouch on his belt, and pulled out the wedding ring Peter had proposed with the first time.

“Hey! That’s mine!” Peter reached a hand out only to have it smacked down.

“No it isn’t!”

“Yes it is! That’s my father’s ring! When did you even get it? How?”

“Well yeah, but you proposed to me and I said yes and according to Vogue the ring belongs to the person it’s given to for as long as they intend to get married to the person who proposed, and if you break up they get to keep the ring unless they’re the person who breaks off the engagement. If you actually get married the ring always belongs to the person who was given the ring because they fulfilled the contract of marriage set by the ring,” Wade rambled.

Peter was a little flabbergasted by the speech. “But we were never engaged.”

“Yes we were!” Deadpool lifted up his mask high enough to stick his tongue out. “I said yes to your first proposal, you had just left already.”

Peter scrubbed at his face with his hands. “Let me get this straight. After you told me we weren’t dating and you revealed that you’ve been sleeping with other people you said yes to me after I’d jumped off the building? Why?”

Wade dug a toe in the ground. “Because I want to marry you. And I am currently not dating anyone but you. Ever again.” he said with a sheepish shrug. “I just didn’t know how to tell you that I wanted to be real boyfriends, or fiances, so I just kind of acted like we still were. And I read an article. Several articles. But Look! They work! We’re together!”

Peter blinked stupidly. “What I’m hearing is that I don’t have to propose to you because you already accepted.”

“Do it again anyway!” Wade bounced excitedly. “This time I can say yes to your face and then there can be sex! There was no sex last time! What kind of bullshit is that? Well, I had sex with myself, but that’s nothing new.”

“Okay.” Peter drew in a deep breath. Despite the overwhelming evidence that Wade would accept him this time the nerves still rattled his knees.

“Wade Wilson, will you marry-”

“YES!” Wade slipped the ring onto his finger while squealing loudly. Then he ripped his mask off and started making out with Peter, whose mask was still firmly in place.

“Slow down there tiger, My spandex is still firmly in place.”

“I know,” Wade moaned. “I’ve always wanted to see if I can get you off by tongue-ing your dick through your suit.”

As Wade tackled him to the ground Peter couldn’t help but think that it sounded like a great way to start a brand new experiment.


End file.
